From spring 1909 through the following winter, Pablo Picasso executed more than 60 portraits of his companion Fernande Olivier. These works—produced in a variety of formats and media—exhibit a range of artistic approaches dedicated to a single subject that stands out in the history of portraiture. Even more significant, this series of works coincided with the invention of Cubism. Containing 82 color illustrations and 68 duotones, this catalog explores the Fernande portraits and related works as a single oeuvre culminating in the magnificent Head of a Woman (Fernande)—one of Picasso's rare pre-1912 excursions into sculpture.

"The book is so well and so fully illustrated that one could imagine the exhibition had come to one's desk.... The three essays accompanying the reproductions add substantially to the knowledge and considerations most of us could bring to its sharply focused theme. Additional illustrations in the essays ensure that the book becomes, in this respect, the exhibition augmented."—ArtBook

"We get to see one subject, explored in depth by one astounding artist, at one impossibly important moment in the history of art. It gives us the chance to really concentrate on a few works that don't stop posing questions and striking sparks off each other.... Picasso is working without the rules—and without a net—and every single move has to be figured out from scratch, tested just by launching into it.... I cannot think of any other moment in the history of art where an artist has this much freedom, and has to decide all for himself what he should do with it.... He's not working toward cubism, or any other -ism for that matter. He's just working.... Picasso is not the alchemist-magician that became his favorite pose; he's more like an eager young genius working long hours in the lab."—Washington Post